


Shut-eye

by bottledyarn



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Gen, Sleep, Sleep Deprivation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-08
Updated: 2012-04-08
Packaged: 2017-11-19 13:13:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/573661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bottledyarn/pseuds/bottledyarn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn sleeps everywhere and the boys make fun of him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shut-eye

**Author's Note:**

> Originally by request on my tumblr.

            They all had the tendency to pass out after long days of signings, interviews, concerts, press meetings…but in the past few weeks, all of them had begun to build up a better tolerance for being tired.  It was necessary, what with their schedule getting crazier and more intense.  To be exact, all of them had built up a tolerance with the exception of Zayn.

            They’d tried energy drinks, coffee, slaps on the cheeks whenever he looked sleepy, mandatory chilly showers…but he still would doze off at rather inopportune moments and locations.

            Some places and times were worse than others- radio interviews were fine, they would just jostle him awake and return to normal, but twice he’d fallen asleep on national television shows. They’d all be sitting on the usual couch and one of them would feel Zayn’s head drop onto their shoulder lightly. 

            The audiences would miss nothing and instantly start ‘aw’ing, and the interviewers would instantly launch into something relevant to Zayn’s sleep.  Zayn would blearily answer their questions and at the end of the interview stumble back to the car with the rest of them and sleep, stretched across one of the seats.

            They started getting used to it after a while, but when he started sprawling across one of their laps as he fell asleep, it got plainly amusing.   He’d yawn several times before leaning harder into them, his head drifting slightly closer until it slipped down and he landed across their lap. 

            They never woke him up- instead, they would see how loud or silly they could be without him waking up.  For whatever reason, he usually managed to fall asleep on Louis the most, so Niall, Harry, and Liam were the masterminds behind the tests. 

            When Zayn fell asleep in Louis’ lap on the tour bus, the other three instantly jumped into motion.  They headed for the small fridge, and Louis started hissing at them to stop it.

            “Guys,” Louis said, trying to whisper-yell. “This is stupid; he’s allowed to sleep without you tormenting him.”

            Liam snickered at something Niall was gesturing at in the fridge, completely ignoring Louis’ pleas.  The other two ignored him as well, staring steadfastly into the fridge.

            “Come on, Liam, you’re the mature one,” Louis whispered. “This isn’t right.”

            “You’re just babying him because he’s turning into your lap dog,” Liam said. “He didn’t get mad when we started Christmas carols last time.”

            “That’s not the same as putting…what are you going to put on him, anyway?”

            Niall held up a squeeze bottle of chocolate syrup triumphantly, making Harry laugh lightly. 

            “No!” Louis said. “That’ll get everywhere!”

            “You can just wake him up,” Harry said. “Go on.”

            Louis glanced down at the sleeping boy and unconsciously smirked, imagining him with chocolate sauce on his face.

            “Even you think it’s funny!” Niall said, advancing with the syrup.

            Louis pressed his lips together, watching Niall carefully start squeezing the chocolate onto Zayn’s cheek. He lined his eyebrows and lips and drew a careful little mustache as well.

            Zayn didn’t wake up, so they started adding things- a bit of whipped cream, cherries- until he resembled a sundae more than boy. 

            He finally woke up when Harry put a cherry on his eye.  He woke up slowly, scrunching his forehead as he struggled to consciousness.

            “Wha-” he said, reaching a hand up to feel his face as he sat up.  “What?”

            The other three had already escaped the room, leaving the dessert-boy deserted with Louis.  

            “Sorry,” Louis said sheepishly. “They thought it’d be funny.”  
            Zayn blinked at him, staring down at his hand, now covered in chocolate and whipped cream.  A cherry slid off his nose and onto his knees and a small giggle escaped Louis.

            Zayn stood up, making his way towards the bathroom. “I’m sure glad I’m on tour with adults and not small children,” Zayn muttered, wiping more of the toppings off.

************************************

            After the sundae incident, Louis promised himself he would stop them from messing with Zayn when he fell asleep, but the next time it happened, Louis himself dozed off as well, waking to discover that they’d been tied together at the wrists so that they couldn’t turn away from each other.

            “This is ridiculous,” Louis said, struggling to slip out of the binds. “Why can’t you guys just let people sleep in peace?”  
            “Zayn sleeps like a baby kitten,” Harry said. “And he’s rubbing off on you, it’s just too amusing.”  
            “Yeah, and we can’t let such good opportunities go to waste,” Liam said. “Not when they can end like this.”

            “Just untie us, okay?” Zayn asked.

            “Can’t,” Niall said. “That’s like an octa-knot or something.”  
            “Well, we’ll just go outside and make a big news story about this,” Louis said. “Come on, Zayn.”

            Louis tugged the both of them outside, where several paparazzi managed to get pictures of the two, bound together front to front.

            “This is ridiculous,” Louis muttered, dragging Zayn back onto the bus and searching out the driver to cut the strings holding them together.  “I can’t believe they’re so immature.”  
            “I should just stop sleeping,” Zayn said. “This is my fault, anyway.”

            “You shouldn’t have to,” Louis said, rubbing his sore wrists. “You should be able to sleep without getting tied up and abused. They sleep sometimes, too, we don’t attack them.”  
            “Maybe we should.”

************************************

            It got bad pretty quickly.  The boys dreaded falling asleep, even at night, as they nearly always woke up with some sort of strange _thing_ adorning them, or they’d be tied or glued to something…the possibilities when someone was sleeping were endless and dozens of different plans were carried out.  Some involved multiple victims, others involved multiple criminals…

            Eventually the public managed to find out, as one prank involved tying Liam very securely to a rope and then leading that rope out of the tour bus and handing the other end to a very confused (but very excited) fan.  Management got rather upset at that, and suddenly the tour bus was retrofitted with strange locking bunks that prevented any more pranks from occurring.

            Of course, that left only Zayn to be tormented, as he still tended to fall asleep outside of his bunk.  Louis refused to let the pranks go on unless he happened to fall asleep, too- he and Zayn had an alliance.

            Finally the intensity of the pranks died down and they ended up just teasing Zayn every time he fell asleep- it still occasionally happened in interviews, and the fans (as well as the hosts) found it adorable and amusing.

            There were one or two incidents where one of them would wake up with whipped cream on their nose, but those were few and far between and weren’t taken badly by any of them.

            The only time one of them got mad was when Harry woke up completely clueless to the fact that he had several obscenities written on his forehead and wasn’t informed until he wandered to a store and was told by some random passerby who didn’t even know who he was.

            But it was all fine and dandy, certainly better than when it was only Zayn being abused during sleep.  They did all respect peaceful sleep just a _bit_ more, though.


End file.
